Tuesday, May 20, 2014

Now Playing: Godzilla

Sixty years ago, Ishiro Honda’s iconic classic Godzilla (or, more accurately, Gojira) came out. The King of Monsters has reappeared dozens of times since, sometimes serious, sometime silly, every time entertaining.

Flash forward to 2014, and Godzilla is back on screen. Having watched the one remade in the 1998, (which was a straight-up monster movie with heroic humans), I was pleasantly surprised by the movie’s more serious turn as well as its indictment of WMDs, human hubris, and the general attitude of “shoot-first, investigate-later”. I didn’t expect science (science!) to be a factor and I certainly didn’t expect a coherent storyline, but both were present and accounted for. Not to mention a cast of very capable actors, with Bryan Cranston, Ken Watanabe, and Juliette Binoche adding their usual panache.

I won’t go into too many details, because spoilers would actually ruin the movie. Suffice it to say that if you’re Sci-Fi geek, you’ll love it. 3.5 out of 5 stars. (And while the trailer is good, it was the teaser that got me going)